Live cattle exports came to the focused attention of animal rights
campaigners and the Australian public when animal cruelty was shown on Four
Corners.

The program included vision of Australian cattle being butchered alive in
Indonesian abattoirs.

The public response was intense, swift and vitriolic. It forced the Labor
government to stop live cattle exports.

Labor had been in power for three years and had done nothing to ensure
that Australian cattle were treated humanely in Indonesia. The trip over to
that country was controlled by live cattle shipping rules, but once in the
hands of Muslims who insist that cattle be killed by knife while fully
conscious, the cattle were brutally killed.